I come from a country which has recently added a civil union law which effectively creates a second class citizen. Though previously the rights of those citizens were less, i'm not sure if this stepping stone/compromise was a mistake for the LGBT movement (we have no queers in ireland :p )

it seems like it will be many years before equality is achieved in Ireland, which i think is a great shame.

'but when it went through all these other structural changes it was still called "marriage" '

And no, it was not always called marriage, wedlock and other older terms were used...
Of course a name change is not necessarily, i just think it's a good solution.

@putin 'Only because you refuse to appreciate what this word represents in terms of integrating an excluded group of people in order to make your argument. '

fair enough. but as pointed out, i don't think this one little legal change will suddenly make all bigotry go away as you seem to claim.

it is far easier to take a softer approach and get a larger group of people on your side than to antagonize a percentage of your opponents and harden their views.

'Basically Ora & co are telling the LGBTQ people that they ought to make this concession,'

i'm not telling anyone what they should do or accept.

In fact i don't see it as a concession. It would mean I personally wouldn't get to be married, and do you think i give a shit about that? (though in Ireland a legal marriage cert and a church ceremony are already two separate things...)

I don't actually know what the best solution for gained the most acceptance the fastest is, but then neither do you.

To be entirely frank, what I've been trying to say here a little, without saying it, is that this "abolish legal marriage" move seems to be a ldesperate hail Mary pass by the side that is ultimately losing this debate. (Not in the forums I mean, in society in general) Marriage equality seems to be the way everything is moving, and I can't help feel that this sudden rush to the seemingly reasonable middle ground alternative at the last moment is an odd misdirection tactic.

@ ora - to answer your point about the situation in Ireland, I'll tell you about the marriage equality situation in Canada, where I live. By 2003, court decisions had made same sex marriage legal in 8 of 10 provinces and 1 of 3 territories. The unpopular Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin fought like hell to pass the Civil Marriage Act which would legalize gay marriage across the country and by 2005 it was passed (by which time over 3000 couples had already been legally married), even though the act was opposed by about 60% of Canadians. Within two years the hullabaloo that had surrounded the Civil Marriage Act was largely forgotten and public opinion had swung such that gay marriage was now supported by a majority of Canadians. On taking power Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper held an open vote on reopening the issue. The move was greeted with staggering indifference from the public and was defeated 173 to 125 in the Commons and the issue has never entered the public discourse since. So given that example, you'll understand why I'm a little skeptical when people talk about not being sure that marriage equality won't turn more people against the LGBT community. In the short term maybe. But within two years, all but the most determined bigots just stopped caring.

yeah, i guess that's an ideal example, now that some legislation has been put in place in Ireland i think it will be many years before people actually take this issue seriously enough to re-address it.

I guess the answer is to make things work right in the first place... :-/

"now that some legislation has been put in place in Ireland i think it will be many years before people actually take this issue seriously enough to re-address it." - Perhaps, but then, perhaps not. The civil unions as a marriage, but not quite thing actually makes a good rhetorical tool for LGBT activists. They get to say "They've fobbed us off with this fake marriage and now we're still second class citizens" etc. It's an argument that wins sympathy quickly.

I wonder why people against same sex marriage don't immigrate to Iran.

Remember that Iran's President Ahmadinejad said that "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country. We don't have that like in your country. ... In Iran we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who's told you that we have this."

I am strongly in favour of same sex marriage, and I am glad that the corporate bodies have taken a favourable stance on the issue. This also shows that corporate lobbyists cannot bend every law passed by congress in their favour.

@TC: Personal interest, are you for or against same sex marriage

An interesting quote with regards to the resounding defeat of Ohio Issue 2 yesterday that so applies to this subject...

"I think people generally prefer incremental change to sweeping change,” Seitz said in an interview today.

“I’m not disputing that there that there may be a need for sweeping change. But sometimes, incremental is as much as you can get. And politics is fundamentally about doing what’s achievable, not always what’s desirable.”

What was Ohio's issue 2 yesterday?

Keep or repeal SB 5 which was about restricting public employee's collective bargaining rights amongst other things. The people of Ohio told the Governor to stuff it and gave back those rights to public unions.

Yep. Proud day for Ohio. Proud day (somewhat) for Mississippi too.

I was axctually kind of torn on the issue. I don't like the idea that a fire department or police department can go on strike and put my and my family's lives at risk, but I felt it contained a lot of other things that were bad (like the insurance deduction that went to the general fund instead of straight to paying the employees' insurance premiums). I also feel non-security services *should* be allowed to strike (like the teahcers), just restricting that major option for when it would result in endangering public safety.

The firefighters and police weren't allowed to bargain on equipment needed for safety. That's ridiculous. If people are concerned about public safety voting for issue 2 is the worst possible thing they could have done. Kudos to the firefighters, they really hauled ass on this.

Oh, I agree they need to have some form of bargaining. I just think a fulll on strike so that there is no police or no fire/EMT (or worse, none of eitherbecause they are supporting each other) should be outlawed to the extent that it is a *serious* threat to public safety. But, that said, they need some for of regress and bargaining, if just that they could do a sort of "half strike" where they could go on strike provided a minimal staffing was done. Sort of like the brownout police and fire districts. For instance, Hebron fire district has two fire stations. They could shut down one as a strike and make all calls route through the other. For places with only one district/department/station, neighboring communities could agree to cover their calls so the public wasn't put at unnecessary and excessive risk.

Ditto nurses, who weren't allowed to bargain on adequate staffing levels for patient safety. My wife works in a hospital and it is chronically understaffed. Issue 2 = anti-safety.

it my be different elsewhere, but over here nurses would go on a 'work to rule' before full on striking - where 'work to rule' means they only do specifically what is required by contract, and no more...

which is like a 'half strike' i guess.

Yeah wasn't referring to striking, just general point about not being able to bargain about staff levels.

The irony would have been that if it passed, who was going to arrest the police if they went on strike? :-)

And I doubt the cop walking the beat would have been willing to enforce arresting a fellow public worker if the fire departments went on strike.

Now, I guess the one thing I don't understand is what nurses had to do with anything. they are employees of the hospital and, at least here in Cinci, most hospitals are privately "owned". they aren't gevernment entities beyond being required to accept any patient and collecting money from agencies like medicare/medicaid and the like.